BRUNSWICK, Maine — Members of the activist group Brunswick Area Indivisible make protesting a regular affair, showing up to speak out against the Trump administration at least twice a week. But with Immigration and Customs Enforcement this week launching large-scale operations in Maine, they say it’s even more important to show support for their neighbors through protest.
More than 100 people met at the Town Mall on Tuesday afternoon as a part of the Free America walkout, a national effort by the Women’s March encouraging Americans to walk out of work, school and other activities to protest ICE raids and President Donald Trump’s policies. The protest fell on the anniversary of Trump’s second inauguration.
Participants were met by honks of support and a few shouted cusses as they walked a few blocks down Maine Street and then back to the mall, displaying signs decrying ICE and Trump, and chanting “support the Somalis” and “power to the people.”
“We’re walking out for the workers, we’re walking out for the immigrants, we’re walking out for health care, we want ICE off of our streets,” said Sheryl Search, who helped organize Tuesday’s protest as the head of the action group of BAI.
The group typically demonstrates Tuesday evenings on the overpass on Route 1 and Wednesday afternoons at the Town Mall.
In response to the anticipated spike in ICE activity this week, BAI organizers have added another recurring protest to their schedule, planning to meet on the overpass every Saturday morning for the foreseeable future.
Reported sightings of federal immigration agents intensified Tuesday, days after officials began to speak publicly about a rumored uptick in ICE activity in Lewiston and Greater Portland.
Search, the protest organizer, said people are increasingly looking for a way to express their discontent with the administration, especially after an ICE agent shot and killed Renee Nicole Good on Jan. 7 in a neighborhood south of downtown Minneapolis.
On the Saturday following Good’s killing, Search said at least 250 people showed up on the overpass to protest.
This week, ICE and Good were front and center to many Brunswick participants in the nationwide walkout, as were other issues like Trump’s treatment of Somali Americans and his push to annex Greenland.
“Trump’s destroying our country,” said Molly Fawcett of Brunswick. Fawcett already had the day off work, but nonetheless spent a few hours “walking out” from everything else Tuesday to protest.
She said she has been concerned for her friends who are immigrants — whom she has been regularly checking up on — as Maine’s cities, towns and school districts prepare for a possible ICE crackdown.
“It’s terrifying,” Fawcett said.
A few people working at the businesses in downtown Brunswick stepped out of their shops to clap for walkout participants, including Hannah Beattie and her staff at Hatch on Maine.
Wanting to show her solidarity for immigrants in the community, Beattie is selling handmade heart signs crafted out of vintage quilts, with all proceeds benefiting the Maine Immigrant Rights Coalition.
Regine Whittlesey, of Brunswick, joined the walk with her husband. A 72-year-old immigrant from France, Whittlesey compared current events to the fascist era.
“My parents went through World War II. My father, he was in the resistance. Here I am in the resistance today,” she said.
After just celebrating the life of Martin Luther King Jr. a day prior, Whittlesey said she was struck by how applicable the civil rights pioneer’s message of inclusion and acceptance is to the current day, as immigrants around the U.S. fear for what’s next.
“His words could’ve been written today,” she said.
This story was originally published by the Maine Trust for Local News. Katie Langley can be reached at klangley@mtln.org.